John Chapter 14 verse 23 Holy Bible

John 14 : 23 Bible Verse Songs

• Where I Belong by Switchfoot
• Trust and Obey by Don Moen
• I Won't Go Back by Ricky Dillard

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 23. - Jesus answered and said to him, If a man, let him be whosoever he may, love me - there is the germ and root of all - he will keep my Word (λόγον). In Ver. 21 we see the complementary statement, "He that has and keeps my commandments loves me;" here, "He that loves me keeps my Word." In Ver. 21 obedience proves inward love, and may indicate to the world the fact of the Father's love and my own response. Here our Lord is laying down the principle of relation - the law of close intimacy, the conditions of higher knowledge. The keeping of the Word is a certain consequence of holy love. And my Father will love him. So far Christ has only reiterated the great statement of Ver. 21, but instead of saying, "I will love him, and manifest myself," he added, We will come - the Father and I - to him, and take up our abode, make for ourselves a resting-place in his dwelling (πἀρ αὐτῳ); cf. the analogous and wonderful parallel in Revelation 3:20. There is a clear utterance of Divine self-consciousness. It is worthy of note that such an expression as this sounds a profounder depth of that consciousness than any phrase (λόγος) already delivered. Apart from the stupendous corroborative facts elsewhere on record, this seems, to mere human experience, either awfully true or infinitely blasphemous. The Father add g will come together in the power of the Spirit, and we will dwell within the loving and obedient soul. This phrase suggests the mystical union of the Divine Personality with that of those who have entered into spiritual relation with Christ through love and obedience.

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(23) If a man love me, he will keep my words.--Our Lord repeats the condition necessary on the part of man in order that the manifestation of God to him may be possible. This is an answer to the question of Judas, the world in its unbelief and rejection of Christ's words, and without the spirit of love, could not receive this manifestation.We will come unto him, and make our abode with him.--For the plural, comp. Note on John 10:30. For the word "abode," comp. Note on John 14:2. The thought of God as dwelling in the sanctuary and among the people was familiar to the disciples from the Old Testament Scriptures (see, e.g., Exodus 25:8; Exodus 29:45; Leviticus 26:11-12; Ezekiel 37:26), and the thought of the spiritual temple in the heart of man was not unknown to contemporary writers. Philo has a remarkable parallel in his treatise, De Cherubim, p. 124, "Since therefore He (God) thus invisibly enters into the region of the soul, let us prepare that place, in the best way the case admits of, to be an abode worthy of God; for if we do not, He, without our being aware of it, will quit us and migrate to some other habitation which shall appear to Him to be more excellently provided" (Bohn's ed., vol. i., p. 199. See the whole of chap. 29). Sch?ttgen, in his note, quotes from a Rabbinical writer who says, "Blessed is the man who strives daily to make himself approved unto God, and prepares himself to receive the divine guest." (Comp. 1Corinthians 3:16; 1Corinthians 6:19; and Revelation 3:20.) . . .